Heaven

With the popularity of books like Heaven is for Real, 90 Minutes in Heaven, and The Five People You Meet in Heaven, heaven has been hovering in the spotlight. Meanwhile, theologians like N.T. Wright and Scot McKnight have been emphasizing that it’s the Kingdom of God on earth, not heaven above, that Christians should truly be looking to. Both trends raise the question: What are we waiting for?

Last fall, the best-selling children’s author Nancy Tillman published her book “The Heaven of Animals,” in which “when dogs get to heaven they’re welcomed by name, and angels know every dog’s favorite game,” and where “horses in heaven are never alone, and grass is much sweeter than grass here at home.” Ms. Tillman, who attends a nondenominational, evangelical Christian church near her home in Portland, Ore., said she was “not a theologian.”